Buckle up kiddies it's about to get sad(er), hope you enjoy

Levi gives Jean some compassionate leave after the funeral and while he's incredibly grateful for the time away from all the blood and all the death and all the rest of it, it gives him too much time to think. He tries to do some useful things like cleaning and pretending that he doesn't spend more than two hours a day at home and it works but his thoughts keep turning back to subjects he doesn't want to have to deal with. It's not just being alone inside his head to think about how he could have done more to save Marco; his mini sabbatical means that he has no chance to talk to Armin.

He thinks once or twice about going round to Armin's but he has no idea if Armin would be home or would even want to see him if he was. When he finally works up the nerve into going round there is a big buff blond guy waiting outside so he thinks better of it. Could be a new partner or something... Maybe he'll find a way to talk to him at work...

The week goes by way too quickly and before Jean knows what's happening he's back at Trost General, preparing himself for a long shift. A coffee will set him up for the day so he heads over towards the break room. As he nears the door he hears voices and hangs back to listen, instantly recognising one of them are Armin's.

"I mean I have been for a while now," Armin says.

"I figured," Levi's voice says and Jean wants to know what they're talking about so continues to hang back. "It was rather obvious."

"Sorry..." Armin sounds so dejected that Jean just wants to hug him.

"It's fine," Levi says, "but I'm worried. Why are you sleeping here so much when you're not on call."

"It's nothing."

"Arlert," Levi says a little more firmly, "it's obviously not nothing. You need to get out of this place every once in a while otherwise you'll go crazy."

"Okay."

"I'm not going to be angry, just tell me. I might even be able to help sort out whatever it is," Levi says.

"It's just that my ex has started coming round to my house again, trying to get me to take him back, and it's easier if I'm not at home when he shows up," Armin says. Well that must be the big buff blond, Jean thinks to himself.

"Have you thought about calling the police?" Levi asks. "They can help you out, get restraining orders or something."

"No it's fine," Armin says. "I don't want the trouble."

"Arlert..."

"No seriously," Armin says hurriedly. "He'll get bored eventually and leave me alone when he finds himself someone new. It's just because he's been turned down."

There's a long pause before Levi sighs. "If he keeps bothering you then you need to talk to someone, okay?"

"Okay."

"Changing the subject," Levi says after another pause, "have you spoken to Kirschtein lately?"

Silence.

"Um... no," Armin finally says and Jean can guess that he's blushing. "I haven't seem him since the funeral."

"I just wondered how he was doing," Levi says. "I'm worried about him as well."

"You worry too much," Armin chuckles.

"God help me if it's not the patients it's you lot," Levi says.

Now Jean feels even more awkward about listening in on the conversation but he can't leave. He wants to hear what Armin might reveal about what happened. Would he tell Levi about the kiss or would he keep it to himself? Would he have any reason to tell him?

"I can go see him at some point and check on him," Armin says and Jean can't help but smile.

"He's back at work today so I'll try and catch him at some point, don't worry," Levi says.

"Excuse me," a voice says from behind Jean suddenly and he turns to see a small dark haired girl hooked up to an IV drip standing in front of him, holding onto the pole for support.

"Hi..." Jean says, feeling confused. Okay I have somehow acquired a child... "Are you okay? Are you lost?"

"I'm looking for someone, can you help me find him?" she asks.

"Sure thing Sweetheart, who are you looking for?" Jean asks. He has no idea how to talk to children and now seems like a really bad time to start learning.

"I'm looking for my Uncle Levi," the girl replies. "He's a doctor here."

"Sure he's in here," Jean tells her feeling a little baffled. He's never really thought about Levi outside the context of the hospital before, he's never really thought about him having a family but he supposes he must. "Um what's your name?"

"Mikasa," she replies. "And you are?"

"Jean Kirschtein."

"Are you a doctor too?" she asks after a short pause. "You look like a doctor."

"I am yeah," Jean says, still unable to believe that he's even part of this conversation.

"Good then I can trust you."

"That's very sensible, trusting doctors," Jean agrees.

"I trust some doctors," Mikasa says matter-of-factly. "I don't like the ones with needles."

"Fair." Jean doesn't really have anything else to say to that but Mikasa is looking up at him expectantly. He rubs the back of his neck. "Um shall we go in and see your uncle?"

"Yes please."

"Okay." He extends his hand to Mikasa who takes it and he leads her into the break room. He knocks on the door before the enter. "Hello?"

Levi rolls his eyes. "You don't have to knock Kirschtein, I know you've been gone a week but you still work here you fu–"

"I found a visitor," Jean says cutting off the end of Levi's sentence. Even if she is his niece she probably shouldn't hear him swearing like a sailor on leave.

"What?"

"Uncle Levi!" Mikasa cries happily letting go of Jean's hand and running to Levi. "And Armin's here too, yay!"

Armin turns and smiles when he sees her. "Hi Mikasa, how are you doing?"

"I'm great," Mikasa beams at him.

"What are you doing out of bed?" Levi asks picking her up and putting her on his lap.

"Was bored," Mikasa replies. "Wanted to come say hi."

"You know you shouldn't be wandering around," Levi scolds, "it's dangerous."

"Sorry," Mikasa mumbles, looking sheepish.

"Well it's a good thing Jean found you and brought you here safely," Armin smiles. Jean looks down at Armin and their eyes meet for a brief second. A blush springs to life on Armin's face and he turns back to Mikasa. Guess he's still not ready to talk about that kiss yet then...

"Come on Monkey I'll take you back to your room," Levi says putting her back down on the floor and pushing himself to his feet. "Say thank you to Jean for bringing you here."

"Thank you Jean," Mikasa says smiling up at him and Jean can's help but smile back despite how strange it is hearing Levi call him by his first name.

"No problem."

"It was nice to meet you," Mikasa says.

"It was nice to meet you too," Jean says.

"Bye Armin."

"Bye Sunshine," Armin says.

"Come on Monkey," Levi says taking her hand and leading her towards the door. Just before they leave Levi turns back. "Oh Kirschtein, your man Springer is in again."

"Okay I'll go see him," Jean nods. "Thank you."

Levi and Mikasa leave the room and an awkward silence falls between Armin and Jean. Jean wants to say something but he doesn't know what and jumping in with 'so that kiss after my ex's funeral' is really not the way to go about it. He clears his throat to say something at the very least but Armin gets to his feet and hangs his stethoscope around his neck.

"I should be getting on too," he says. "Good to have you back."

"Armin wait," Jean says grabbing Armin's wrist before he can leave. Terror fills Armin's eyes. He knows what's coming but there's no way Jean can't not ask him.

"Y... yeah?"

"Can we talk, at some point?" he asks.

"Um..." Armin looks away, cheeks turning pink.

"Please," Jean begs. He needs to know why Armin kissed him and if he can kiss him again that would be a bonus.

Armin's teeth tug at his bottom lip uncertainly and the action is so damn cute that Jean wants to kiss him anyway. "Okay," he says finally. "Later okay, I need to go see a patient now."

"Okay," Jean says letting Armin's wrist slip through his fingers and watching as Armin practically darts from the room. He sighs to himself. I guess I'll go back to work then...

"Hey Doc," Connie grins as Jean walks through the door to his room.

"Hey man," Jean grins back taking Connie's hand and shaking it vigorously. "How have you been?"

"I've been great," Connie says. "Been travelling round Africa, it's been awesome!"

"Wow," Jean nods, impressed. "Well travelled."

"Hell yeah," Connie grins. "I wanted to get stuck in and immerse myself in some culture for a change."

"And," Jean says, his eyes flicking over Connie's chart, "I see that while on these travels you neglected to go and see any kind of medical professional, medicine man or scary Witch-Doctor with the holes in his ears."

Connie at least has the decency to look sheepish. "Sorry Doc, I got kinda busy and forgot all about it.

Jean chuckles derisively and shakes his head. "Pst Connie," he says in a theatrical whisper, putting his hand to his mouth as if he were telling him a great secret, "cancer is one of those things you need to keep a check on."

Connie rubs the back of his neck in embarrassment. "I know, I know, I just got kinda distracted."

"Oh yeah?" Jean asks sceptically.

"I met this girl," Connie replies, a smile spreading over his lips as he thinks of her.

"Colour me surprised it's about a girl," Jean says rolling his eyes. "So she comes on to the scene and you forget to check up on your own health? That about the size of it?"

Connie shrugs. "She makes me forget about it for a while at least," he says. "I mean I've been feeling fine since I was given the all clear so it was easy to sort of push it to the side. You know?"

"Yeah," Jean says with a sad sigh. "I know." He'd give anything to be able to block out some of the thoughts going on inside his head. He plasters a smile on his face. "Go on, what's her name then?"

"Sasha," Connie replies, "and she's amazing Doc. Like she's so funny and beautiful and she cooks the best food. She's just brilliant, quite easily the best thing that's ever happened to me."

Seeing the love and adoration in Connie's eyes shows just how crazy he is about this girl. Jean pats Connie's knee and smiles. "Then you need to get out of here so you can get back to her, okay?"

"It's a routine biopsy," Connie shrugs. "I'm not nervous, you know."

"Good."

The rest of Jean's day is nowhere near as fun. It's getting right back into the swing of it, the question of why he does this creeping back again. It's particularly gruelling when he knows he's faced with someone who is blatantly lying to his face.

"So have you taken any drugs in the last twenty-four hours?" he asks a blonde girl with a dazed, bored expression in her eyes.

"No," she says, "I never take drugs." Judging by how red and unfocused her eyes are if Jean believes that then he'll believe anything.

"Good," he says, plastering a huge fake smile on his face as he picks up a syringe from the tray next to him, "because this injection I'm about to give you will kill you if it's mixed with narcotics."

The girl's eyes widen. "Oh yes, drugs, I take them all the time," she says.

"There we go," Jean says. He's about to start chewing her out for lying and wasting his time when a knock at the door stops him. He turns to see Hanji standing there.

"Hey Jean, you got a minute?" she asks.

"Yeah." He strips off his gloves and goes to the door. "Everything alright?"

"I just thought you should know," Hanji says that look of sympathy he knows only too well in her eyes and Jean's stomach drops, "Connie Springer died earlier."

"What?" Jean almost can't believe his ears. But he was fine when I talked to him...

"He arrested earlier, there were some complications and there was nothing we could do," Hanji says. "I'm sorry, I know the two of you were close."

Jean doesn't say anything. He can't find the words to say. Connie was supposed to be one of the ones who got out of this shit-hole, not one who ended up downstairs. Someone's going to have to tell his new girl... she needs to know...

"Do you want me to finish up here and you take a break?" Hanji asks.

"Please," Jean says, his voice hoarse.

"Sure things," Hanji says giving his shoulder a squeeze.

"She's high as a fucking kite by the way," Jean tells her as he leaves the room.

He doesn't even think about where he's going. He needs somewhere where he knows he will be alone. Thankfully the first door he comes to is an empty supply closet. Shutting the door behind him he braces himself against one of the shelves and shouts out his frustration. Frustration for Connie, for Marco, for every patient that has ever come through the doors that he wasn't able to save.

Once he's finally done he sighs, runs his hands over his face and looks round. As it turns out he isn't as alone as he thought. Armin is standing almost hidden in the corner, eyes red and tears streaking his face. Jean straightens up and runs a hand through his hair. Well this is incredibly fucking embarrassing...

"You okay?" he asks.

Armin opens his mouth to lie but a chocked sob is all that comes out. "No."

"What's wrong?" Jean asks taking a step towards him.

"It's Mikasa," Armin says. "She died."

"What?" For the second time in minutes Jean feels like he's been punched in the gut. "What happened?"

"She was fine," Armin says shaking his head, "and then her heart just stopped..." Another sob racks his chest. "How is that fair? She was only six, how is any of this fair?"

Tears streak down Armin's cheeks and Jean's heart breaks for him, for all of them. He closes the distance between them and pulls Armin into a hug, holding him tightly and letting him cry into his chest.